Anam Cara
by Abydos Jackson
Summary: Stripped of everything. Bereft and alone, how does an Aeducan Princess exist on the surface, and who can she turn to to make sense of the new world she's discovered? A story of the power of friendship, and of what it takes to love after loss...
1. Chapter 1

"**Alone. At the edge of despair. I could not have known what was to come. Something that would mend my broken soul. A light found in the darkest of times."**

XXX

Freyja's heart broke.

Her hand grasped the metal bars of the prison cell as if they were her last link to life...and she watched Gorim walk away from her, his head bowed low, shoulders slumped.

Defeated...

Just as she was.

He took her life with him; everything she knew walked with him. Her lips parted in a sharp intake of breath. Shoulders shaking, legs trembling, until a gasp escaped her. A moan...and she sank to her knees in the dirt.

The betrayal of her brothers stung. The loss of her father's trust wrenched her heart. Stripped of her rank and banished to the deep roads tore her apart. But watching Gorim leave shattered her soul. She could have born it all, as long as she had him, but without him...

Freyja watched long after he'd gone. Her eyes focussed on the last place she'd seen him, unable to tear them away...before her head sank against the bars of her prison, her forehead resting on the cold metal. Her only true friend and the one person in her life who she trusted.

The dagger he had had pressed furtively into her hand hung limply in her fingers. His last gift to her...all she could take of him into the darkness to keep her safe, all the protection he could give her.

A sob. Just one, before she dragged herself to her feet, wiping the back of her hand against her tear stained face. She was an Aeducan and she wouldn't let them see her shamed like this when they sent her to the Roads. Time enough once the darkness had swallowed her later...

XXX

Thanks, Setrus...as always. For not letting me give up, for not pressuring me...and for keeping the dream alive.


	2. Chapter 2

**'"Find the Wardens..." he'd pleaded with me. And I held onto those words, but not for myself. I only wanted to die knowing I'd tried for _his_ sake, it was too late for me. I'd been in this dark place before, and only _he'd_ been able to pull me from it.' **

XXX

Freyja ran.

Her heart pounding; breath a painful fire in her chest. Stumbling over the uneven ground her legs pounded the tunnels of the roads...once her training ground. Her territory. Her birthright. They held no fear for her. But that had been when Gorim had walked beside her.

Now she was alone...forsaken... and the roads had turned against their Princess. Pursued through the darkness, it had become a place of screaming shadows and snarling beasts.

So she ran...and her heart told her she was going to die. She ran...and her mind threw despair at her.

She held her dagger tightly in her her fist, felt the bindings dig into her palm as her legs took over. Sprinting through the darkness, her fear feeding her, she ran for what was left of her life – a tiny scrap of 'self' to cling to.

Yet she was tiring and the Shriek _would_ catch her. It's piercing screams echoed around her and she knew she was being hunted. A sob...a breathless whimper and she started to slow, her mind racing. Images of Trian's body lying in a pool of blood . The anguish on father's face. Gorim's misery as he'd half raised a hand to touch her one last time, before leaving forever. A low moan and she stumbled, her free hand reaching out to brace herself against a tunnel wall. Freyja's chest tightened, her eyes screwed up tight, tears streaming through the frozen sweat on her face. Her hand scrabbled uselessly at the stone. She wasn't a part of this any more. The connection she's always felt was tainted by her brother's betrayal; his lust for power.

Bhelen. A surge of bitterness and Freyja's palm slapped against the wall. Gasping, she felt her fear start to turn. Her teeth clenched as she remembered his smirk. _No. _ His satisfied sneer as her father had pronounced her banished and stripped of all of she was and all she'd been. _**No!**_ She turned...her back pressed to the wall, facing the direction she'd been fleeing. Her name stricken from the family records...written out of history, forbidden from returning, denied her final resting place. The back of her head hit the wall with a thud and her eyes squeezed shut, her face screwed up tight as a fire started to smoulder in her.

Her empty left hand twitched as the Shriek's screams came closer. Bhelen had stolen her life from her, jeopardised their family's name, and pushed an already fragmented Orzammar to the brink of disaster. And he, not her deserved to die.

Eyes closed, breathing slowing, Freyja dug deep, and felt it stirring...the anger, the power of it streaming through her like a flaming river, flowing from beneath her, pushing her from behind...a pulsing – a pounding in her heart, a drum beat in her ears. She _hadn't_ been cast from the Stone, it was all around her now...filling her, completing her, and if she still had that, there was hope.

Her eyes snapped open, and head cocked to one side she listened, waiting for the Shriek to enter, for the Stone to take her...She smiled grimly, chin raised in sudden defiance...or to feed the monster within...to deliver retribution to the man who had taken from her.

She crouched, a small bounce in her knees, ready to defend herself. Eyes narrowed she waited, letting the anger build...and tried not to think of the empty space by her side as the cries of the Shriek grew louder. Freyja fought against the icy fear, her head tilting back slightly as the fire washed over her...consuming her, heart beating faster, blood pumping.

She blinked once, then couldn't stand the waiting any longer...pushing against the wall she kicked off, and ran headlong back through the tunnel with a cry of her own, and meeting the Shriek with her startled yell managed to strike it before it hit her – a back handed sweep of her dagger that left a deep score across the creature's chest. She danced back, and ducked as it grabbed for her, feeling her hair stand on end as it screeched a sound that pierced her soul.

Primitive.

Hopeless.

The fear rose in her again and she stumbled as her loss hit her again. She struck out, half blinded by her heart broken rage. A flurry of panicked attacks that became an explosion of manic fury.

She fell upon the shriek twice her size. Fear banished as her eyes blazed and her skin seared with a need for its blood. A stab to its groin as she lashed out with her left fist. _I hate you..._

A slash to its neck as she kicked out at its legs. Watching it fall to the floor with a glint in her crazed eyes.

_**I hate you...**_

She kicked a booted foot at the snarling jaws before she landed on the creature's chest and plunged her blade deep into its neck as she felt its spittle on her face. Crying out, she raised the dagger again and again...a frenzied flow of attack punctuated by her screams for vengeance. The shriek grabbed at her head, pulling her hair free of its fastenings, scraping its nails down her cheek in a desperate need to throw her off and she saw something new in its eyes. It feared _her_...she was the bringer of its death, and she struck one last time, punching the point down through the creature's eye with a final cry.

And then stillness...as Freyja's dark hair flowed loose behind her, her face bloodied and eyes wild.

Chest heaving, panting in the darkness...a darkness that having claimed her now released its hold, and she sobbed once, pushing herself away from the bloodied mess on the floor, horrified eyes casting around for something to ground her.

Her boots scrabbled on the floor as she tried to stand, knees trembling as she rose. Another sob as the blood lust left her, and Freyja staggered to one side, her stomach heaving as she emptied its contents onto the floor. She rested her forehead on the cool stone of the tunnel wall and waited for the heaving and the trembling to subside, thenwiped a bloodied hand across her face in a vain attempt to clean it, before casting a tear stained glance behind her.

Orzammar.

She shook herself roughly. _You-will-**not**-cry_...she chastised herself, before she wiped her blade on her torn shirt with shaking hands and made herself walk away, following the only path the Grey wardens could have taken.

She didn't look back.

XXX

My thanks to Setrus – for giving me the most perfect of gifts.


	3. Chapter 3

"_**All I could see in you was your pain – and I feared it. It called to me, but I turned from you, not understanding what it was I recognised in you..."**_

The Korcari Wilds were so..._vast_.

She wasn't yet used to such open spaces before and it was...unsettling. She'd heard stories of the surface, of course, but Freyja had never imagined just how unending the sky was. She tried not to look up at the dizzying expanse of blue and swirling white, her eyes instead darting from side to side, taking in the foliage and odd looking ruins.

Freyja blinked against a ray of sunlight breaking through the fog and shivered, wrapping her arms around her body. Orzammar was an airless, city of searing heat and humidity. The surface was... confusing. A series of mystifying shifts in the air that made her shiver and her hair whirl about her face. Moisture falling inexplicably through the air that made her turn her face to the sky in shocked delight. It was a world without boundaries of stone that made her feel as if she'd float away.

She felt so _small_.

Freyja walked in a contemplative daze. She reached out a hand to touch a delicate looking flower as they passed, marvelling at the silky softness of it against her palm. There were things about this place that were marvelling, she thought, if only that sky wasn't so heavy and oppressive over her head. She gulped miserably as she remembered the comforting stone ceilings of her home, and shook away the tears that prickled at her eyes.

The three men that walked slightly before her were muttering again. The Whiner, the Cut-Purse and the Idiot. The Whiner had a warped, idealised view of the world. Freyja sniffed in mild irritation. He spoke of duty and honour as if they were things in a child's fairy tale – with little understanding of the sacrifice involved. They were transitory things to him...duty was something he could pick up and put down again when it suited him. His heart may be in the right place, she admitted, but it would fail him when tested. And by the Stone, he winged liked a babe!

The Cut-Purse was mildly nauseating. A smirking and lewd objectionable man, who eyed her like a slobbering animal. He had more raw guts than the Whiner, he was a reasonable man with those blades he wielded, but Freyja had little respect for his motives, and doubted whether he'd stand and fight under pressure.

And the idiot...Freyja paused for a moment as she regarded the young Warden. She watched the way he walked, sizing up his gait and recognised the movements of a warrior in him. She screwed up her nose and admitted to herself that he knew how to fight. She'd even go as far as to say he was skilled, but he talked _far_ too much – about nothing, and he hid behind humour, used it as a weapon. There was something veiled behind that humour, and it grated on her already twanging nerves._ Why is he fighting to pretend he's less than he is? _

She allowed herself a pang for Gorim in this world of strangers. "I miss you." She whispered under her breath, then steeled herself with a toss of her head. _Shut yourself off. _She told herself. _The only one you can depend on now is yourself. _

Freyja clenched her fists and turned her attention back to the men, rolling her eyes. The Whiner was looking around them apprehensively and the Idiot was trying to argue something, his arms gesticulating wildly. She huffed and stomped past them with a shake of her head. She needed to get out of this place with the endless sky, back to the comfort of the ruined camp where she could close her eyes and imagine the stone around her...and dwell on vengeance for her brother, she admitted to herself, her eyes narrowing.

A noise ahead brought Freyja to a sudden stop, her head cocked to one side as she recognised a familiar growl...and grinned.

Here was a welcome distraction from the fools behind her.

Instinctively, Freyja ran straight at the sound, distantly aware that the Idiot was closing behind her, his sword already out of its scabbard by the sound of it. She raised her eyes in surprise even as she ran. He'd reacted quickly, the other two men were still fumbling with their weapons.

They were hurlocks, she realised, and the speed they were coming at her indicated they were as eager for _her_ blood as she was for theirs. _Good_, she thought. _Let them try. _Her daggers settled comfortably in her hands and she felt the now familiar distancing of self that happened when she fought, her blood beginning to pump hotter and faster.

The first hurlock died in an onslaught of rapid slashes and stabs, its blood fiery as it sprayed across her face.

The Idiot beat her to the second, knocking it to the ground with his shield before finishing it quickly with a stab to the creature's neck...his stride didn't break as he moved to the third, and Freyja still had enough presence of mind to grudgingly approve of his clean kill before they reached the Alpha together. Their eyes met briefly before their blades struck the dark spawn together...a moment of frozen clarity...a second of silent understanding...before it passed, and the roar of the creature filled her ears.

Freyja instinctively moved to the hurlock's rear as the man - Alistair, she recalled, the idiot had a name after all, distracted it with feints and a roar as loud as the beast's own as he ran at it's back, daggers thrusting into its kidneys as the pommel of Alistair's sword was thrust into its face. Slipping her blades free she kicked at the back of the Alpha's knee and skipped aside as it fell, the Warden's sword swooping down and spitting it through its chest with a scraping of metal against bone.

A quiet moment as they collected themselves, looking around for more foes, and then Alistair's hand fell heavily on her shoulder in a friendly gesture that was so uncommon to her and the circles she was used to moving in that Freyja froze. The man grinned down at her, eyes sparkling with that residual and intoxicating excitement she herself often felt after a kill . "We work well together, don't you think?" He laughed and stood towering over her as she blinked up at him through the murky sunlight.

"I...suppose..." she muttered, confused at his boisterous friendliness and was grateful when the Whiner and the Cut-Purse stumbled over...pitifully late, and looking uncomfortably sheepish. Freyja eyed the men for a moment with disdain, before remembering Alistair's hand was still on her shoulder. She shrugged it off in the pretence of reaching for her back pack and scrambled around for an empty vial. Tossing her head back she moved in front of the Cut-Purse before he could reach the closest dark spawn corpse. "The first is mine, _boys..." _She said in a tone of voice that left no room for challenges, her eyes narrowing, hand on one hip. "I think that's fair, don't you?" And she bent to fill the vial with blood before anyone could say anything, aware that Alistair's grin was turning into a smirk.

The stench of the fresh kill filled her nostrils and her stomach clenched in an attempt at control. A Princess of Orzammar would have had someone do this for her, she thought as she steeled herself against thoughts of home, but a grey warden recruit had to learn to do this, alien as all of this was for her.

Grey Warden...

_What did that mean_, she thought. For her, for Orzammar, for her father, and half-wit brother...she stopped herself. No, not a half-wit. She closed her eyes and screwed up her fists against the vial of blood in her hand. A pang...of anger...and pain. _He bested you_, Freyja admitted to herself, before shaking herself and standing, thrust the vial back in her pack in a temper.

She cast around for something to remind her of home and found a rocky outcrop in the side of a grassy bank. She moved to it with purpose and splayed her hand across the cool stone...so much cooler under this open sky than it was at home, and felt the familiar if distant tingling under her hand of the Stone...a pulse beating through her...reminding her that no matter what she'd been taught, she could never be truly banished, never truly be cast out. _Grey Warden..this is my path for the moment...but I'll make sure it leads me back to you, Bhelen. Be **sure** of that! _

A sudden noise behind her and she slumped and rolled her eyes. The Whiner was at it again...she struggled not to reach angrily for her daggers and caught Alistair's eye again.

The man winked at her.

He _actually_ winked...before he turned his face back to the two incompetents before him in obvious frustration.

Freyja blinked...and searched her thoughts for a moment...finding she didn't care if this lumbering idiot of a commoner human revealed such impudence.

_Now...why is that, I wonder? _

xxx

Thanks to Setrus, for putting up with my insufferable whining...and for all the other stuff too.

"We cannot tell the precise moment when friendship is formed. As in filling a vessel drop by drop, there is at last a drop which makes it run over. So in a series of kindness there is, at last, one which makes the heart run over."  
**James Boswell**


	4. Chapter 4

"**I thought he'd lied to me, that he'd betrayed me...and that hurt more than anything I'd ever felt before...It was almost more than I could bear."**

XXX

Freyja screamed...

...a primeval sound ripped from her throat as she hung suspended, naked in a void of pain.

Piercing shafts of agony driven through her heart pinning her in the darkness. She threw back her head and howled again, pulling her knees to her chest as the pain wrapped around her and she started to spin, a thousand daggers slicing into her skin, her blood washing over her skin.

She vomited violently, her chest heaving as she spat out bile, her hair whipping round her face as she span faster and faster. Her fists clenched as her body was thrown into a series of torturous spasms and she yelled out loudly as she felt herself thrown against something hard and firm, felt the sickening thud as her ribs cracked.

Stillness...

...and she sobbed through her pain, her body screaming at her, sticky blood crusting on her skin.

A single thought – _Where am I?_ - before the pain took her again and she groaned, her skin on fire.

_There was a cup...no...a chalice..._but the thought was snatched from her mind by a wave of nausea and fresh pain as her heart pounded in her chest. Freyja gasped, and waited for it to pass before rolling onto her knees, her hands scrabbling for a hold of the wall she'd been thrown against as she struggled to pull herself to her feet.

She whimpered as she tried to put one foot before the other, her head scanning the darkness for something...anything or anyone that could help her. A sound broke through, distant at first, then close and loud...Laughter. A menacing laugh that made her blood run cold and caused her to shiver uncontrollably. It seemed to have a life of its own...so tangible she shrank back from it as it sought to grasp hold of her, to yank at her hair and whisper threateningly in her ear.

A bright light in the fore-ground now...and the Laughter pushed her forwards, flashing images of her mother's wasting death before her. Freyja saw it all and her heels scraped in the dirt at her feet as she pushed uselessly against it, attempting in vain to stop from moving towards the emerging figures in the light. "N-no..." She stammered...and another spike of pain was driven through her heart.

The Laughter rolled over her and yanked her body into the light and she saw herself, her chubby little 6 year old self, sitting watching her mother adoringly as she read her stories. Rosy cheeked, with hair as dark as her own.

A flash of blinding light...

Her mother laying in bed, her body wracked with the silent sobs that were too painful to shed, her hair hanging limp and thin against a grey face, the skin pulled tight against it...and her 7 year old self standing at the foot of the bed with her brothers, her hands grasping uselessly at the bed sheets as her father wept.

The ground dropped suddenly away from beneath her feet...

Falling...her screams echoing in her ears as her arms flailed desperately for something to halt her decent...

...then she was sprawled on the cold floor, as the Laughter grew louder...she could _feel_ its smirk behind her as her head was ripped back, forced to observe the scene unfold before her. Blinking against the light, she watched a stoic 10 year old Gorim taken from his home.

"**Taken away for _you_...your father demanded a companion for his grieving child. He was _forced_ to be your friend..." **The Laughter again, mirthful, delighting in her grief.

Freyja whimpered, knowing it for the truth, wanting to close her eyes against the icy knowledge in her heart.

She surrendered then, to the pain and the knowledge, surrendered to the laughing presence as she was yanked to her feet, hanging limply in its grasp as she was dragged further into the light.

_Oh, by the Stone...No! _

The Commons.

She was naked and bleeding in the Commons.

An Aeducan Princess. Shamed. Her hair dishevelled around her small face. Eyes raw with the force of her tears.

And everyone was watching her - the Outcast. Their laughter joining that of her unknown captor.

She was dragged forwards, bare feet bloody and dirty, her arms seeking uselessly to cover her nakedness.

The Tavern. And more laughter. Voices that she recognised. Those who had once bowed and called her Lady. And one voice clear above them all. Gorim.

Drunk and gesturing wildly with a tankard overspilling with ale.

"Hah! You should have seen her face, my friends, when I said my good byes! So _tender_...so _heart broken!_" A sozzled giggle as he slammed the tankard down on the table. His voice dripped with sarcasm as he snorted. "My _Lady_! She'd been eyeing me like a piece of meat for years..."

_N-no...no...I..._

"...treated me like her personal slave. Bloody Aeducan whore! Hah! Told her I was banished to the surface...that we'd meet one day if she escaped the Roads." A snort.

Freyja reached out a shaking hand for him..._No...Gorim, please..._

"She really believes I had nothing to do with her betrayal...by the Stone, I practically pulled off Bhelen's hand when he offered me money to go along with his plan." He hiccuped., grinning whilst he wiped away spittle with the back of his hand.

Freyja crumpled. Her soul shrivelling in her heart. Broken. Alone. Dragged away...stumbling back as the Laughter pulled her with it...back into a world of pain.

She welcomed it.

Clung to it.

It drove out Gorim's face.

She screamed as loudly as she could and drowned out his words.

She surrendered as her body was torn apart, focussing on the talons and the teeth, on anything that would make her forget the pain in her heart. And all the while the Laughter flowed around her, mocking her pride, her fall from grace, her love...

Another voice - the softest whisper - half heard words "...sister...vigilant...duty...sacrifice..."

Freyja blinked 

There _was_ a chalice.

And blood.

There was pain...but also...life.

And _this _wasn't it.

This wasn't real. This _couldn't _be real. Gorim would _never _purposefully hurt her.

She struggled for control against the Laughter...and suddenly knew it as _herself_.

It was her deepest loathing for herself. The Laughter was her. Her failure and her hurt. Her pride and her demon.

She gritted her teeth in defiance. You're y_our own worst enemy_...her mother's words to her. _And only you can defeat it..._

She heaved a painful deep breath and screamed into the darkness.

"You will **not** control me! I defy you! You will **not **take everything from me. You will NOT win!"

And she was falling again...fast at first...then slowing, drifting, the pain beginning to fade as a softer, kinder darkness claimed her.

Freyja opened her eyes...to find two faces looking down at her in the twilight. One relieved, one anxious, and both smiling.

"Welcome back, sister." She didn't know whose it was, she didn't care. Just smiled weakly and closed her eyes again as relieved tears came. She felt a hand on her face wiping them away, and then arms lifting her free of the floor. She felt the cool air ruffle her sweaty hair and allowed herself a different surrender.

To her fate...and to trusting these men who had sat with her when she was lost in the dark.

XXX

My thanks to Setrus...for lessons hopefully learnt. xxx


	5. Chapter 5

"_**'Complete your mission.' Duncan told me. Then I could go back to him. He meant everything to me at that point. But I knew I'd never see him again. The world changed that night. My world changed...and I don't know what I would have become if not for you..."**_

XXX

Freyja could almost feel at home in this tower of stone.

Even the darkspawn throwing themselves at their small party were somehow reassuring. The familiarity of fighting these creatures in this stony fortress a bewildering comfort after the shock and confusion of recent events.

The Joining ritual had been...harrowing, but now she had a clear purpose again.

Now she had a sense of belonging - to something bigger than herself- something to distract her from the overwhelming loss she'd felt since her exile from Orzammar. Yet something she was painfully aware she didn't yet understand.

Freyja cast a sideways glance at Alistair as she followed him through the murky corridors. He was twitchy; His sword hilt spinning restlessly in his grasp with a nervous energy she hadn't seen him display before.

_He wants to be part of the battle_. She thought, _He needs to be with the other Wardens._ Well, so did she, but it was more than that with him. Something was driving him on, and the more darkspawn they came across, the more alarmed and determined to drive to the top of the tower he became.

She gritted her teeth and tried not to look out of the window. Freyja had never been so high up before, and it was...unsettling, she admitted to herself. Night was falling fast and she found her eyes drawn by the star sprinkled sky through a ruined window. She caught herself in an unsteady wave of vertigo before, steadying herself, she allowed her gaze to linger for a moment. They were dizzyingly beautiful, and still a wonder to her in this alien place.

Dragging her attention from them, Freyja turned back to Alistair. His head was slightly to one side, his eyes distant, almost as if listening to something...and then she felt it too. A burning sensation searing through her that made her gasp sharply and shudder, a wave of nausea that was somehow both revolting and welcome at the same time...something she'd felt all too often on entering the tower.

"Alistair, what _is_ this...?" She began before he held up a hand to stop her, his voice low as he turned to face her.

"I'm sorry..." he muttered, looking troubled. "We've had no time to instruct you about the Order, or how the Joining ritual connects us to our enemy." He placed a solid hand on her shoulder...again that unsought touch that confused her. "But we _have_ to get that Beacon lit."

His eyes sought hers sincerely for a moment, before she blinked at him, nodded and gestured at the corridor curving to the right ahead of them. She shifted slightly, allowing Alistair's hand to slide from her shoulder. She waved a hand to stop the mage and soldier accompanying them to halt, and gestured at the nearest door ahead of them, knowing without understanding how, that she already knew the answer to her question.

"There are more genlocks in there?" More of a statement than a question.

Alistair nodded, an enigmatic smile playing on his lips.

Her eyes narrowed at him, the feeling of his unasked for touch still warm on her shoulder. Then she smirked at him...shyly at first, then with a hardness that took him by surprise.

"We should dispose of them then, don't you think? That Beacon is waiting."

Then she was off, sprinting down the corridor leaving the three men staring after her in bewilderment. Alistair caught himself in a brief moment of amusement before the familiar guttural growling of the darkspawn snapped him out of it and he careered after her.

Freyja's daggers were already a blur of motion when he reached her, almost thrusting her aside in his eagerness to get to her. Not to 'save' her, she realised when she saw the determination on his face, as if she were a maiden in distress, but merely to be with her...to share this experience with the only other Grey Warden in sight. A familiar feeling prickled at her consciousness as she thrust and parried with her blades – comradeship. It washed over her as she sensed him move his back to hers, and countered the ugly surging in her veins of her proximity to the darkspawn with a purity she hadn't felt in a long time...not since Orzammar. She shook that thought from her head quickly and focussed on the creatures before them.

They were surrounded. Enclosed by a mass of snarling and vindictive menace. Freyja eyed them carefully, savouring the moment. A familiar thrill coursed through her as her arms moved, meeting blades, deflecting blows; her feet moving in a dance with Alistair's steps – always back to back, never allowing their foe to separate them. She was dimly aware of their companions on the edge of the fray, but **this** is where she loved to be, at the heart of it – an opportunity to prove her skill. The world around her focussed sharply, her skin tingling as her movements flowed with Alistair's.

Freyja found herself grinning as they travelled down the corridor; movements beautiful in their deadly grace, leaving a trail of darkspawn corpses in their wake...until the last was slain, and they found themselves at the final staircase before reaching the top of the tower. Chest heaving with her exertion she raised her eyes to her fellow warden's and recognised a glimmer of excitement in his eyes that matched her own, before a veil of concern fell over him. "We need to hurry." He muttered needlessly, and without sheathing his sword climbed the last stairs to reach the Beacon.

X

X

X

Duncan tore his eyes from the carnage around him to look up at the tower.

Still no flaming beacon...

...which meant Alistair and his charge had yet to reach their goal.

_Maker, what's keeping them? _He thought before twisting to deflect an axe blow aimed for his unprotected skull.

Worry gnawed at him, worming into the pit of his stomach as he launched a fresh attack on his foe, his sword slicing through the creature's face as he simultaneously thrust his dagger deep into its ribs, twisting it forcefully.

He stepped over the corpse, barely acknowledging its demise as he cast frantically around the battle field, an unusual panic clawing at him. He stood for a moment in isolated quiet that seemed to stand outside of time. Their men were scattered throughout the ruins, their lines broken. Chaotic and undisciplined fights everywhere he turned. They were fighting for their lives, Duncan admitted to himself, and knew this for the end. _His_ end. He glanced at the tower again. Still no light.

_Cailan, damn you! I told you this was no game..._But there was no anger behind his thought...no venom. Cailan was a man formed and moulded by others. And Duncan had failed him, he'd tried to do better with Alistair.

"Maker...where _is _Alistair?" He murmured out loud, before the sound of battle came rushing back to him in a scream of arrows and roaring death. Duncan ducked low and rammed his shoulder into a dazed hurlock stumbling towards him and cast his eyes around for his King. Alistair was on his own for now...no...not alone, he remembered with sudden and fierce relief. The Aeducan Princess had some mettle in her. He snorted with fleeting amusement and a sincere and hollow wish that he would live to see what those two would make of each other.

But his charge now was to find his King. Cailan's golden armour was the brightest thing on this bloodied and mired field, and it didn't take long for Duncan to pick out the man. He was alone, his personal guard scattered and dying around him, and Duncan's blood ran cold at the sight.

His feet were moving before even he was aware of it, but he knew he wouldn't reach the man before the creature looming behind him would.

The ogre was enormous. A colossus of rippling muscles and sinew. It was awe inspiring...and deadly.

...and its vice-like claws were swooping down at Cailan.

Duncan watched in horror, his legs pumping uselessly as he realised he was never going to reach him in time. Watched as the life was crushed from his King.

And his hope died with Cailan. Cold, icy certainty...this _was_ a true blight...and Fereldan...Maker, perhaps even all of Thedas, was going to fall.

Anger flared in him. Unbridled and passionate, and he growled in defiance. _I will die here, today. But I'll do it the manner of **my** choosing._ Duncan's eyes hardened, a half smile on his lips as he accepted his fate...and vowed to take this creature of darkness with him. He gritted his teeth and sprinted at the ogre, leaping with an energy he didn't realise he possessed and plunged his blades deep, grappling upwards.

The ogre screamed, its arms flailing at the Warden as it sought to fling him aside, but Duncan continued to climb, thrusting his blades deep. They were eye to eye now, and Duncan felt the creature's hands grasp him as they had Cailan, squeezing the breath from him. He felt his ribs crack the air forced from his lungs in an excruciating rush, but he refused to stop, his weakening hands still twisting his blades deep.

They stared at each other...the ogre roaring its defiance, Duncan glaring back, his eyes darkening as the creature continued to grasp him, blood forced from his mouth...neither wanting to be the first to let go...

And then it fell...the ogre toppling to the ground, and Duncan fell with it...his hands torn from his blades as he was thrown forwards, his broken form sliding in the mud.

He lay prone for a moment, his crushed chest heaving in painful gasps, dark blood staining his face.

Cailan.

He had to reach his King. Duncan knew it was useless to hope there was still life in him, but he wanted to die with the boy, with someone he'd known...and loved, he admitted to himself. Yes. He loved both of Maric's boys. If only his duty had allowed for more. He clenched his teeth, and pulled himself to his knees, one arm clutching at his sides as he crawled to the golden form before him.

The word was fading before him now, dancing before his eyes, each passing second an agonising reminder of his failure. He _had_ to reach Cailan...it was the last duty he could perform. He pulled himself in one last effort to reach the Cailan's side and reached out a shaking hand to touch the blond hair. Once so bright, and now caked in mud and bloody gore.

Duncan's fingers slipped through the young man's hair and he swayed, all energy spent, nothing left for this life but his last few breaths. He hit the ground with a thud...no pain now...just a sense of loss...until he saw them...

The Beacon.

Dancing at the top of the tower in fiery defiance against the night sky. Too late to save _them_...but Duncan's fluttering heart leapt. Alistair lived.

And blissful hope flared as the life drained from his body...

XXX

Heartfelt thanks to Setrus for life, the universe and everything.


End file.
